A Coaching Guide to Asking Reflective Questions: Part 1

Take a minute to think of your coaching toolbox. What are some of your go-to questions? Go ahead and list a few.

Now reflect on those questions.

What are the types of questions you use?

Why do you use those questions?

How do you know when to use one question versus another?

How do you know when a question is effective?

How do you adapt your questions based on the teacher’s responses?

How do you use questions to sustain a back-and-exchange with teachers?

This blog series is going to address these reflections and support your effective use of questions to prompt teacher reflection and growth in myTeachstone. We’ll start by unpacking the different types of questions you might use and why.

Though we know that open-ended questions are the best way to prompt teacher reflection, it helps to remember that we want to do this with intentionality. And to ask questions intentionally, we need to think about what response we are hoping to get from a teacher and which question would be best at getting that answer.

Now, imagine you have just completed an informal observation on this teacher, focused on how she is using Behavior Management strategies during the clean-up transition from free play to small group time. You noticed several effective moments including clear and consistent expectations, monitoring of the classroom, and redirection when appropriate. You also noted moments to build on--including inconsistently anticipating problems and attending to children’s positive behavior.

Your goals for the feedback conference are to help the teacher:

Identify which moments are effective and which are less effective

Compare what is happening in these interactions

Analyze the impact these moments have on the children’s behavior and the learning time in the classroom

Brainstorm next steps to enhance her application of effective Behavior Management

Here we have identified four types of questions you might ask based on your goals for the conversation, the teacher’s learning goals, and the specific observation at hand: identification, analysis, comparison, and brainstorming.

Given those types of questions, let’s look at some specific questions you could use.

Type of Question

Potential Starters

Specific Examples

Identification

At what point did you notice …?

Describe what happened when …

Tell me more about …

How did you attend the the children’s positive behaviors?

Tell me what you said and did.

Comparison

What do you think went well?

What do you think did not go well?

What was the difference in these moments?

Tell me about a moment when you did not attend to the positive. What was different?

Why is it harder to attend to the positive at that moment?

Analysis

How did you know [a behavior] was effective?

Why did you decide to …?

What is the value of …?

Why is it important to attend to children’s positive behaviors?

How do you see your children respond when you note their positive behavior?

Brainstorming

How will you plan to …?

What are some ways you can …?

How will you include …?

What are some common positive behaviors the children show during transitions?

What statements can you use to attend to those behaviors?

Here you can see several effective questions with various goals for teacher learning. Used together, these questions can help the teacher think about specific interactions in her classroom, analyze those moments, and brainstorm ways to implement her effective behaviors more consistently.

And this is just the beginning! In addition to the ones above, you might ask questions that:

Elicit the teacher's perspective

How did it feel to …?

How comfortable are you …?

Encourage evaluation

What did you want the children to learn in …?

What conclusions can you draw about…?

Make connections or integrations to the real world

Tell me about a time you …

How is this behavior like …?

Encourage planning

What skills might the children gain through …?

How can you include [this behavior] to support that learning?

Facilitate prediction

What might happen if …?

How do you think the children would respond if ...?

Prompt thought processes

Tell me about your decision making in that moment.

How do you know …?

Let’s go back to the beginning and look at your list of go-to questions. In what category do they fit? How do these categories change how you think about your list of questions?

Please share your ideas, as well as other categories or questions that you have found especially effective in conferences!

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"I’ve just begun my journey into the world of coaching. I am eager and excited about this opportunity to help pave the way for more effective teaching. I’ve recently been given my list of classrooms that I will be working with and I’m anxious to get started. I get ready to meet my first teacher, Ms. Linda, and I just know that she will be excited to meet me and we will form an instant bond and work together for the benefit of the children in that classroom.

It’s been a great year. You have just conducted some professional development trainings for the group of teachers you are coaching. You got the opportunity to visit their classrooms and see them in action, do formal and informal CLASS observations, and had countless coaching conversations. You see that it’s all beginning to click. You have the teachers’ buy-in, and the motivation is high.